If the statistics are correct from the family first guy regarding Colorado I call bullshit on the concept liberalizing drug laws won't increase massively drug use in this country.

The harm reduction logic is so lacking from the Greens - in particular legalization will remove a barrier for 16.5% of 3.6% = 0.5% of total drug users to seeking help. Chloe quoting 16.5% is sad, the actual figure from the report of 0.5% is simply feeble. If they want to stay above 5% at next election maybe they could go back to their printing money policy.

If the statistics are correct from the family first guy regarding Colorado

That might be a big ask! For example what is the likelihood of the truth of this statement from McCoskrie?

there are now more marijuana stores statewide than McDonald's and Starbucks combined

As for

Potency rates of up to 95 per cent have been recorded.

No indication as to where this was achieved - nearly pure THC? He would like people to assume that this was available for sale, but it is more likely in a laboratory.FF are concerned that if marijuana is decriminalised, people will use it and are happy to ignore the fact that people do use at present.

No, but I think the concept may make a useful metric to measure worthiness of proposals on the table. For me, modifying factors that impact illicit drug trade seems a lot more pragmatic than any return to a "legal high" environment.

The chances of getting any serious buy in from the National party for decent drug law reform seems to diminish by the day. For the right, the power of the culture wars seems just to much. Simon Bridges was at it again today, when asked attacking the Greens (in relation to the creation of an astroturf Green party) for supporting drug reform.

All in all, the focus groups and polling must be telling National their are votes in provincial and suburban NZ in scare mongering up a culture war on drugs. As long as National remain committed to political expediency on this issue, the chances of meaningful and sensible reform our drugs laws are not good.

I thought it an excellent essay! The focus on addiction psychology points to a dimension of the public debate hitherto made conspicuous by abscence, but here's the reason: "only about 10-20% of habitual users can be classified as addicts."

That depends how you define addiction, of course! Scientists agreed marijuana isn't addictive long ago. However, habit-forming tendencies easily produce dependency, and that can simulate addiction rather well.

Danyl asks "what if addiction is a constant product of technological progress, meaning it is a problem that will continually escalate and get worse, rather than go away?" We've seen oil-addiction produce runaway climate change. Violence-addiction still produces war, and arms-manufacturing. Money-addiction produces gambling and capitalism, reminding us of the traditional aphorism: money is the root of all evil.

If psychologists weren't collectively inept, they would have already persuaded us that addiction psychology is the root of many harmful behaviours, and ought to be designed-for in our public policy.

Could have done with out the stories from his youth, thats the kind of thing best left for drunken conversation at dinner parties....maybe thats addictive behaviour.This is a good point tho" and the harm is compounded by prohibition. "Govts can get out of the way of individuals seeking help for their mental health. And he does point out addictive behaviour is applicable to many, many things we do as people including sport.

"the Organisation of North American Nations: ONAN" That cracks me up.

The issue is, as he says, people and living in a system which is becoming more and more hostile to the way we are. A square hole/ round peg scenario with catastrophic consequences for us.Govts and those elected to represent are becoming more and more inept at dealing with the growing issues affecting us and our environment. Asking the electorate via referendum is a bad way to go, I agree, most of the electorate will go to whatever bias or prejudice suits them, a bad way to make policy. Tho with mistrust everywhere and on all sides. maybe they should stick to righting the economic apple cart which has fallen over badly because of human greed left to run riot, addictive behaviour again. If you think money cant be an addiction your wrong. And trying to fix the climate crisis heading our way by reining in the worst of the excesses perpetrated by business.

That depends how you define addiction, of course! Scientists agreed marijuana isn’t addictive long ago.

Not any more. Cannabis Withdrawal is officially recognised in the DSM5 as a disorder.

Drug addiction isn’t quite the same as obsessive and compulsive behaviour. It’s very specific to the drug. But there’s obviously going to be some overlap. Not all people get addicted to alcohol but people who do sometimes need to be hospitalised so they don’t die from the withdrawal.

Problem gambling or social media problems, could be better described as compulsive disorders. Yes dopamine happens in the brain , but thats not addiction, its compulsive behaviour.

I like to make these distinctions in the interests of my vocabulary.

If psychologists weren’t collectively inept, they would have already persuaded us that addiction psychology is the root of many harmful behaviours, and ought to be designed-for in our public policy.

And I just want to pull you up on this detail. Psychologists aren’t collectively inept.

Its interesting up till the last paragraph when after saying "I’ll still vote for it." he drops this shallow assessment

My sense is that the cause of cannabis decriminalisation is mostly driven by middle-class liberals who like smoking pot and want more convenient access to it,

It may be the case "middle-class liberals" are behind driving it, they're the ons who have access to the systems to do that. Tho' change wont come if it is only MCL's behind it. Well my sense tells me its not just so they can get easy access. My sense also tells me he is either having a dig at someone. in a singular or plural sense. Or middle-class self loathing got the better of him, momentarily.

It’s the consequence of being a species with a nervous system designed by natural selection, which incentivises behaviour that once maximised our evolutionary fitness by rewarding it with brief bursts of pleasure; but a species that now exercises enough control over our environment that we can endlessly, repeatedly stimulate the dopaminergic pathways in our brains by eating foods loaded with sugar and fat, buying consumer products, watching TV, masturbating to porn, and taking drugs. And, as every addict knows, the highs are always followed by the lows. Repeated over-stimulation of the mesolimbic reward system leads to anhedonia: an inability to feel pleasure, the classic symptom of clinical depression. The logical end points of rationalism, liberalism and consumer capitalism, are incompatible with human nature and human happiness.

Not sure why rationalism and liberalism make it onto his list, they were co opted by capitalism during its rise. Guess he would have to give a deeper explanation as to his reasoning. Just maybe its time to unhitch these ideas from capitalism.His say so isnt a good enough reason for me.

Cannabis is incompatible with human happiness because capitalism. These are the takes that led to the over-stimulation of my mesolimbic system when reading Danyl, and the resulting anhedonia has long since worn off since I quit.

Family First's latest tirade for cannabis prohibition is from an organisation called "Drug Free Australia." Well, according to the Canberra Times (30. 2015), Drug Free Australia is a front group for the Australian Christian Right

Gary ChristianHonorary SecretaryHighlights:Gary Christian is high up in the Seventh Day Adventist ChurchA well known CreationistSpeaker for Drug Free Ambassadors, an initiative started by the Church of Scientology

Quotes:"High overdose rates at the centre were due to drug users experimenting with higher doses, knowing nurses would be on hand to help them"-September 2003. Spreading lies to gather support for the closure of Sydney's Safe Injecting Room

"Mrs McKay can be naive on the facts of drugs,"-February 2002

"I still support her in her fight against drugs but I have been told that she upset people at the Drug Summit with her attacks on the harm-minimisation policy." -February 2002

Science was a "belief system", Biblical fables were "Scientific evidence", and "Civil Rights are a metaphysical illusion",

Books:The Kings Cross Injecting Room - Case for Closure written by Gary Christian(Over the past 4 years, the MSIC and a range of respected health professionals working in the addiction medicine field have pointed out the errors in Gary Christian’s various calculations and extrapolations).

Sorry for the glibness but having gone through the Danyl reading now, finally, it proved to be exactly what I first thought it would be (having long experience of his writing style), a segue to some literary fiction analysis, ending in a rumination that simply states his feels on the matter without any real argument, and chucks some digs at middle class liberals, the drug users which with he has spent the most time.

While I agree with him that a referendum is probably not perfect, the idea it's the exact wrong way to go about deciding on something that is as much a matter of personal moral opinion as it is about all the harm evidence and harm reduction theory that is dominating the debate, is exactly wrong, IMHO.

I feel like a referendum cuts right through all this harm slice and dice shit and just asks bluntly "look, if you think it shouldn't be against the law for whatever reason, how about you just say so?". Because sometimes moral choices are that simple. You don't have to sit at the tail end of a giant scientific research programme to know right from wrong. We don't need wise technocratic institutions to decide for us. We live in a damned democracy, and I know the hypocrisy surrounding cannabis prohibition is Wrong As.

Everyone knows lots of cannabis users. Literally everyone. Most people would not be happy with all the criminal convictions that those people should probably have if prohibition were something that wasn't really mostly for brown people. A very large number, at least in the hundreds of thousands, would like to be able to consume without any fear of the law. A very much larger number again, possibly even a majority, know that they did smoke in the past and are thus hypocrites if they oppose it. A very much larger number again, certainly a majority, know they drink alcohol occasionally, and would miss the right to do so, and it is a much more harmful drug than cannabis from a harm perspective. They drink it anyway, because they like it.

Sure, there are harms. Sometimes weighing up those balances is a matter of personal conscience, and sometimes the way to weigh up those balances across society is to take the total weight of all those balances of personal conscience. Sure, I wish our elected representatives could have the courage to do so, but that's a failing of representative democracy. Fortunately, we also have a direct democracy option and this is exactly the kind of issue it is meant for.